Thursday, April 13, 2017

Has it really been a quarter century since the Great Chicago Flood of ’92?

Twice
in my life I have seen the streets of downtown Chicago completely deserted.
Keep in mind I used to work an overnight shift for the now-defunct City News
Bureau, and the Loop doesn’t die out completely even at 4 a.m.

Chicago River wasn't so orderly a quarter century ago Thursday. Photograph by Gregory Tejeda

But
there was Sept. 11, 2001 when officials had the downtown area evacuated just in
case someone was planning something similar for Chicago to what happened that
day in Manhattan and at the Pentagon in the Virginia suburbs of D.C.

THEN,
THERE WAS the date that occurred 25 years ago Thursday. The date of the Great
Chicago Flood. When the basements of downtown Chicago buildings overflowed with
water, engineers supposedly contemplated using mattresses to try to plug the
hole and a certain generation will not forget the screwiness of that date.

Which
in my mind is odd because the “flood” wasn’t really a flood. It was a leak.

As
in the Chicago River sprung a leak and water flowed out and into the
century-old tunnels that exist beneath the streets of downtown Chicago. When
the water filled up those tunnels, the level had to rise to the various
sub-basements that exist beneath downtown buildings.

Including
the then-Marshal Field’s department store, where we got to hear the famed radio
reports about the fish swimming in the basement at Fields.

WE
LATER LEARNED that the leak was caused when workers with the Great Lakes Dredge
& Dock Co. that was replacing rotting wooden poles in the river installed a
new poll just a little bit off – and wound up puncturing a hole into the tunnel.

This
occurred in September of 1991. But it wasn’t until 25 years ago today that the
water level became so ridiculously high that we at street level could no longer
ignore it.

Personally,
I remember working that day from my post at the pressroom of the then-State of
Illinois Center. Working the telephones, I was accumulating information that
went into the various stories the City News Bureau reported that day. I was
vaguely aware that some people were leaving the Loop.

But
the level of the evacuation didn’t become apparent until my shift that day was
complete and a fresh crew of reporter-types were taking over for the night.

DOWNTOWN
CHICAGO CAN be an eerie place when it is deserted and the only activity taking
place is the changing of traffic signals from red to green and back again –
only it doesn’t matter because there’s no traffic.

No
people either.

It
was reminiscent of a cheesy film I once saw called “Night of the Comet” in
which the passing of a comet somehow unleashes a force that reduces much of
humanity to piles of dust – and the few survivors tried to make sense of their
lives in the remains of Los Angeles.

It
almost felt like a similar force had been unleashed in Chicago – and the city was
somehow all mine to do with as I pleased!

THERE
LITERALLY WAS no one else around even though there still was daylight in the
sky. Not even a newsboy crying out about the “Extra” edition newspapers he had,
but couldn’t find anybody to buy (which I did see on Sept. 11, 2001).

Much
of downtown Chicago’s life returned the next day, although there were the
inconveniences as some places had their plumbing or water service turned off
while officials tried to figure out the long-term solution to the problem. I
also recall my own place of employment being closed for the day a couple of days later – and we were
relocated to the Sun-Times Building. Which since has been obliterated by that
giant tacky tower paying homage to His Excellency, Donald the First!

But
the Great Chicago Flood where the river didn’t overflow. In fact, where else
but in the Second City could a river spring a leak?

It’s
all a part of what gives our fair city its unique character. That, and the hot dogs (Only Mustard Ever!!!)

I am a Chicago-area freelance writer who has reported on various political and legal beats. I wrote "Hispanic" issues columns for United Press International, observed up close the Statehouse Scene in Springfield, Ill., the Cook County Board in Chicago and municipal government in places like Calumet City, Ill., and Gary, Ind. For a time, I also wrote about agriculture. Trust me when I say the symbolic stench of partisan politics (particularly when directed against people due to their ethnicity) is far nastier than any odor that could come from a farm animal.